Love as Pure as Water

It was all going wrong. And even worse, it was all going wrong at the same time.

One of the panels in the cockpit lit up, and a shrill tone began to drone on in warning.

"As if I don't know!" Thomas shouted, wrestling with the controls.

Thomas was a good pilot. He was good enough to know how to react to a mechanical failure during flight, good enough to stay calm and look for the solution. He was good enough to not even mind that the company he worked for was too cheap to hire him a copilot. They generally didn't do much, anyway.

What he wasn't good enough to do was to keep his modified Douglas DC-6 chemical transport plane from losing altitude at an alarming rate. It was a just a bitdifficult to control the plane when two of his engines had caught fire and exploded in a matter of seconds, for seemingly no reason at all.

"Why the hell is this happening?" Thomas complained aloud.

Things weren't looking good. He was still over the Carribean Sea, still hours away from reaching Florida. And there wasn't a speck of land in sight beneath him.

The plane continued to fall, the alarms continued to ring. But all Thomas could do was sit there, overtaken by a sudden realization.

"I'm gonna crash," he muttered. "Gonna die in the middle of the goddamn ocean." He was surprised by how calm he sounded.

The vast majority of plane crashes were due to communication failures. Actual, random mechanical failures were very rare.

I wonder if I'm going to be anything more than a statistic, Thomas thought. I wonder if anyone will remember me.

Thomas had no significant other, no remaining family. He had some friends, yes...but it had been years since they had last talked. The only person waiting for him was the indifferent air control officer at his destination.

Thomas took a deep breath and nodded to himself. He should at least try to survive this. His GPS system wasn't responding anymore, but if he was right, he was just a ways past the Dominican Republic. There were coral reefs here, and the odd chain of islands. It was a long shot, but there was still a chance he could crash next to some tiny, deserted islet, and somehow survive long enough to be rescued.

Another warning siren began to blare, this one even harsher than the last. He didn't have long until he splashed down.

"What a way to go," Thomas sighed, hastily putting on his life jacket. "Nothing more than a number."

As he busied himself sending off an automated distress signal - which he wasn't sure even worked - he wondered if the chemicals in his cargo bay would break and spill out during the crash. There were all sorts...bleaches, dyes, oils. None of it would be very good for the ocean, especially so for the coral reef area he was trying to crash near.

How tragic. By trying to save himself, was he putting an entire ecosystem at risk?

Thomas shook his head. It didn't matter. Even if he wanted to martyr himself for the sake of some coral, it was too late now. The plane was going down in mere seconds. He could see the massive surface of water getting closer and closer, ready and waiting for him to smash against it like solid concrete.

Thomas grit his teeth and tried his hardest to steady the plane's final moments. He wasn't going in nose first - that meant that he at least had a chance to survive this. It was midday, and the tropical waters were warm, so he wouldn't freeze. He definitely had a chance, right?

I just hope there aren't any sharks.

Finally, the impact came as his plane's belly met the waves. It was more violent than he expected. The entire plane jerked and rumbled. He felt a loud, metallic crunch from somewhere behind him - what was that? His wing? Did he just lose an entire wing? The DC-6 was a great model, and heavily upgraded, but there was no denying that it was an ancient design.

That's not very comforting! Come on, happy thoughts, happy thoughts!

The rumbling and shaking continued to rattle him, tossing him around in his chair like a toy. Finally, the plane began to slow to a stop.

But he wasn't even close to being safe. One quick glance through the cockpit door behind him confirmed it - there was a significant chunk of the plane missing, a gaping hole in the left side. And the water had been rushing in for a while now. Already, a puddle was forming beneath his feet as water sept in through the crack beneath the cockpit door. He reached for the door handle, gripped it with both hands, and pulled strongly.

And nothing happened. It was stuck, barely wiggling a little.

"No!" he cried desperately, immediately gripping it again and pulling even stronger.

After all that? After surviving a plane crash, a fucking door was going to kill him?

The water continued to rise. Thomas grunted and pleaded to the door for mercy, putting one of his legs against it and pulling with all his might.

The door did not relent. As the water reached his knees, the animal part of his brain took over. He screamed frantically, pounding and kicking at the door as hard as he could.

This isn't fair! This isn't right!

He was going to die. Worse, he was going to drown, one of the worst possible ways to go. All because of a string of random mechanical failures that he had no control over.

Thomas kept kicking at the door, even as the water reached his chest. He had no other options. There was no way that he was breaking through the windshield, and the little window at the top of the cockpit door was far too small to squeeze through.

If his foot was beginning to throb and ache with pain, he couldn't notice it. The adrenaline in his system blocked everything else out - in his world, there was nothing but him, and the door. The door sneered at him, mocking his efforts.

He kept kicking out of spite. It could be made of brick, for all he cared. He was still going to try.

Eventually, he felt that the door was beginning to buckle. He was making progress!

But so was the water. It was up to his neck, now. With one final, huge breath, he kicked again, converting his panic and desperation into physical force.

Even as the water finally enveloped him, he kept kicking with all the force he could muster. Even if he was to die here, he wouldn't go without a struggle! He slammed his foot against the door again, and again, and again!

And then, finally, it was forced backwards, swinging open to reveal the rest of the plane, entirely submerged. Thomas swam forward without a second thought, swimming right through the hole in the plane's side. As he began to kick upwards, he looked up and realized the true cruelty of his situation.

It's too far.

The plane had been sinking the entire time he had been struggling with the door. And now he was easily two dozen meters beneath the surface of the water. He had already expended the majority of his final breath on the door.

His lungs felt like they were burning with pressure, screaming for relief. He was going to drown before he could breach the surface!

Darkness began to envelop his vision as he kicked upwards even more frantically than before. He was so close! Mere seconds away from survival, but he knew that he was going to die on top of the finish line.

It was cruelty beyond comprehension. What had he done to deserve this? What had turned his plane into a sudden deathtrap? Why did he deserve to die in such a torturous manner?

His vision was engulfed entirely, and he knew it was over. The very last thing he felt was a rough, pulling force around his torso. It seemed that the sharks weren't even going to wait for him to die.

He felt something press against his lips, which was strange. Why would a shark do that?

Everything faded away.

**********

At first, there was nothing.

Thomas didn't know what he had expected death to be like. But this probably seemed right. Nothing to see, nothing to hear, nothing to do...just darkness. A complete and all-encompassing lack of anything at all.

He just sat there. There didn't seem to be any such thing as time here, but it felt like he was there for hours.

And then there was light.

In an instant, the darkness became light. Thomas looked up, looked down, looked at himself...but there was still nothing. He held out his hands to look at himself, but he had no hands. He was nothing, too. All around him, nothing but white light, stretching out...forever.

What was this? Was he a spirit? Was this purgatory?

Then he felt two things begin to happen at once. First, he heard something - barely even a whisper, but he heard it. And second...he felt something pulling him. Was it it the voice? If so, why, and how? He was nothing. How could he hear, how could he be pulled? Who did the voice belong to? What were they saying?

So many questions. And they were all silenced when he realized that the whisper was growing louder, the tugging sensation on his being growing more forceful.

"Back..." the voice said.

"Who's there?" Thomas asked, spinning around. "Where am I? Where are you?"

The sensations grew stronger. If he had a body, the sudden jerking sensation might have made him nauseous.

"Come back..." the voice pleaded, growing stronger and louder still. "Please, come back!"

Thomas looked around, already knowing that whoever the voice belonged to, they weren't here.

"Where are you?" he asked. "How do I get to you?"

"I won't give up!" The voice shouted. Thomas realized that it was the voice of a young woman, rife with desperation.

Thomas felt like he was being stretched apart. The woman's voice - she was doing this, somehow. He didn't understand any of this. All he knew was that he was deeply uncomfortable, perturbed by the sensations pulling on his ethereal form.

"Come back!" the woman repeated. "Please, come back!"

Thomas felt something else. He felt...warm. But he also felt cool, and wet. And then he heard...the sounds of water. Waves?

The ghosts of sensation. Something he no longer had.

But, wait...

It all came rushing back to him. The plane! The crash, him drowning, and that bizarre last sensation he felt! Had this woman rescued him?

"Please!" the woman sobbed, her voice breaking. "Don't...don't die...I can't..."

Thomas realized that he had been fighting her efforts. He smiled, surrendered to the pulling sensation, and allowed himself to be carried away atop an invisible current. He needed no map or instrument. He simply listened to the woman's gentle sobs, following her sounds in the same way that ancient sailors navigated by the stars.

The sounds and sensations grew louder and stronger, as if they were becoming more real. Thomas floated towards them, not having any sense of time. Eventually, the sensations and his perception bled together, combining and becoming the same...

He opened his eyes.

**********

Everything hurt. Thomas had never been so exhausted in his entire life. The warmth of the sunlight suddenly felt overwhelming, and he was welcome for the cool ocean water that he was partially submerged in.

With a sputtering cough, he gasped and tried to sit up, covering his eyes with one hand. More than a few drops of water escaped his lips, and he immediately fell back down, coughing and wheezing for nearly a minute as he got used to being alive again.

"Oh, thank goodness!" the woman said. His body was so overwhelmed, he had somehow forgotten about his savior.

She was too blurry to see clearly, his senses still overloaded, his body aching with pain and exhaustion. But Thomas could make out a vaguely female shape kneeling over him.

"It worked..." she said, voice shining with joyful relief. "It worked, thank Poseidon!"

Thomas groaned and tried to sit up, breathing heavily.

"Don't try to move yet!" she said worriedly. "It's okay, I'll stay with you, I promise! You're safe now. You're alive..."

He decided that it would be best to follow her advice, and simply lay on his back, covering his eyes from the sun. As his breathing slowly returned to normal, his savior adjusted her position so that she was closer to his head. She gently placed his head into her lap, soothingly ran her fingers through his hair with one hand, and massaged his shoulder with the other. Then she began to quietly hum, singing a wordless tune.

Thomas closed his eyes and listened to her. Once again, he let her voice be his anchor, surrounding himself in it, taking comfort in it.

Dazed and exhausted as he was, it was hard to focus on her song. If he could listen properly, though, he was sure that it would have been the most beautiful song that he had ever heard. There was something special about her song. The longer he listened, the more at peace he felt, the more his pain slipped away without his notice. His body felt warm, and not just from being in the sun. The many questions swarming in his mind were pacified, and they patiently sat down, waiting for their time.

Eventually, her song came to an end, and he realized that was feeling incredibly tired. Not the same painful exhaustion that he experienced when he woke up, but the comforting, gentle kind of tiredness, the kind felt when bundled up in warm blankets at the end of a long day. His savior stopped massaging his shoulder and took his left hand into her own.

"It's okay," she promised. "You can rest. I promise that I'll still be here when you wake up."

"Thank you," Thomas mumbled, feeling himself drift away.

She only hummed in response, continuing to run her fingers through his hair until he finally fell into a comfortable slumber.

**********

When Thomas awoke, he realized that his head was still in his savior's lap. Had she not moved since he fell asleep?

On the horizon, the evening sun was falling, casting the sea in a beautiful fire-gold radiance. Thomas watched the sun for a moment, then tilted his head backwards to look up at the woman's face.

She seemed to be asleep, although he wasn't sure how that had happened. She was breathing harder than a sleeping person should, her cheeks were flushed with red, and her hand felt a little clammy. Thomas gently rolled off of her, pushing himself up and sitting cross-legged. The fact that she didn't notice his stirring was...worrying. He thought that she looked haggard, like she was feeling the early signs of a fever.

He reached over and gently squeezed her shoulder, which caused her to stir and shake her head.

"What?" she asked tiredly, rubbing her eyes. "Oh, you're awake...good." She gave a smile, but her pained expression gave the truth away.

"You don't look well," Thomas said gently. "What's wrong? Are you sick?"

"I'll be fine," she softly, shaking her head. "This is temporary. I've just...been here a long time."

"You could have moved me. Your legs must be really cramped, now."

"My legs? Oh, right. Yes...they do feel...rather sore, now that I think about it. But I just...I couldn't move. When I saw your sleeping face...how peaceful you looked. I mean with the plane, and everything, I just...it was too much. I didn't want to risk waking you."

"I get it," Thomas said, looking out over the evening ocean with a pensive expression. The two shared the moment for a while.

"I suppose I should thank you properly, Miss...?"

"Alana," she finished with a smile. "My name is Alana."

"Thomas, " he replied, returning her smile. "Thank you for rescuing me, Alana. It felt like the universe was conspiring against me today. I sure am lucky you were here, huh? I seriously thought I was going to die."

Alana winced, her smile suddenly becoming an uneasy frown.

"What's wrong?" he asked, noticing her discomfort.

"A-about that...I, um, don't really know how to say this, but...you did."

"I did what?"

Alana looked into his eyes, keeping contact for what felt like nearly a minute. Eventually, her shoulders drooped, and she gave a small sigh.

"You drowned," she confessed. "You were dead for at least ten minutes before I brought you back."

He stared at her, utterly dumbfounded.

"I was...dead?"

"Yes," she said solemnly. "I'm sorry, Thomas."

Thomas nodded sagely and started rubbing his chin with one hand.

"So that's what that was," he said. "It was you. You were the one pulling on me - the voice that I heard."

She looked surprised. "You...heard me? What...what was it like?"

She immediately blushed and shook her head fiercely. "No, no no! I'm sorry, I shouldn't have asked that. That was so-"

"It's fine," Thomas said, holding up a hand to stop her. "It wasn't much of anything, really. It's...kind of foggy, but for a while, there was just...nothing. Nothing but total darkness. I wasn't even sure if I was real anymore. Then, when I first began to hear you, feel you? It all got brighter, turned into white light. Then you just got louder, and stronger, and then...I was here."

"That's...incredible..." she said, jaw slackened.

Thomas watched her for a while, finally taking a proper look at his savior. She seemed to be in her early or mid twenties, about this same age as him. She was clad in a large, white cloak. On closer inspection, the cloak was made of finer material that it first appeared - there were swirls of gold trim running around the waist and wrists, with a triangular motif looping around the collar in teal. The cloak was buttoned down the center, with the silver emblem of a trident clasping the two halves of the cloak together at the top. The cloak had a hood, which was currently down, revealing a seafoam-green head of hair that draped just past her shoulders. A single, large lock of her hair drooped in between her eyes, which she unconsciously flicked away.

Her cloak ran down to her waist, but she didn't seem to have any other clothes on. Her legs were long and slender, both of which were partially submerged by the gentle waves. Thomas looked at her hazel eyes, and their gazes locked for a while.

"I was dead," he stated plainly.

"Yes...you were."

"And you brought me back to life."

"Yes, I...I did," she nodded.

"...how?"

"Well..." she fidgeted nervously, averting her eyes from his. "I...how to put this? Um..."

"You don't have to tell me, if you don't want to," Thomas shrugged. "It's one of those things where I don't want to know, right?"

"Not exactly, but-"

"As long as you didn't use voodoo to resurrect me, I think I'm okay with it," he laughed.

"Voodoo...?" she looked at him blankly, tilting her head inquisitively, then shook her head. "No, it's...I think it would be easier to just show you."

She took a deep breath to help gather her resolve, then stood up. Her legs shook, nearly toppling her, and she had to put her hands out to steady herself. Thomas moved to help her, but she held up her hand. She unsteadily walked further into the ocean, arms held out like she was walking a tightrope. When the water reached up to her knees, she turned around and sat down cross-legged, bringing the water level to just below her neck.

"Watch me," she said, closing her eyes and interlocking her fingers. She inclined her head and held her hands close to her chest. At first, Thomas thought that it was some kind of meditative stance.

But really, it looks more like a prayer.

Alana held the position for a few seconds before a radiant light enveloped her body. It wasn't blinding, but it was potent enough to convince Thomas to avert his gaze until the light faded. When he looked back, Alana's legs were gone. A long fish tail, ending in a fin had replaced them, her tail being the same color as her hair. Additionally, a small pair of fins jutted out from either side of her head, covering her ears. These were colored differently from her hair, being more of a mint green. A larger pair grew from each of her wrists, and an even larger pair than that grew from her hips, poking out under her cloak.